


Me As You

by cerisedeterre



Category: Booksmart (2019)
Genre: F/F, Hotel Sex, Nostalgia, Phone Sex, Sharing Clothes, Vibrators
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-14
Updated: 2019-08-14
Packaged: 2020-08-23 17:36:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,183
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20246698
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cerisedeterre/pseuds/cerisedeterre
Summary: How close are Hope and Amy now? How close do they want to be?





	Me As You

Amy hasn’t come back to L.A. since sophomore year at Columbia: with Doug and Charmaine settled firmly in Madison and everybody else she cares about (unless you count Ms. Fine) gone north and east, there simply hasn’t been a reason. She didn’t miss the focus on how everyone looks, the intense attention to appearances—she always wanted to shrink from that, even though she did care how she looked (and, God, she wanted Ryan to see her… yes, Ryan, back then; Hope seemed absolutely beyond her reach, no matter what, or whom, she imagined at night). 

Amy didn’t miss the feeling, in L.A., that there was nothing beyond L.A. except New York. (No one else knew where Durban was. Let alone Gaborone.) But she did miss the Southland sunlight, the lack of winter, the bright blue air. It looks good, even through the thick glass of an air-conditioned hotel. Even at 7am. (Probably because it’s 10am in New York.)

Amy still sleeps in oversized T-shirts, many from conferences. She's been to, like, twelve by now, though this one's her biggest yet, the first where she's got her name on the short program. Sustainable Development: Listening to Women. She’s discovered, after so long in a bunk bed, that she’s one of those people who sleeps best, on the road, if she gets to sleep alone, even if she’s (so to speak) sleeping with somebody else on the regular. This big tee came back with her from Botswana five years ago. It’s got several holes in it, but the cotton’s…. just… so comfortable. And her body, underneath, hasn’t changed very much. She’s filled out a bit, but just a bit.

A beam of strong sun finds her face through the glass. Amy opens her eyes and props herself up on one elbow to see why her phone’s going off. It’s playing “Rebel Girl,” which could be one of her three most important people. (She hates the idea that each person gets her own ring; it’s like an invasion of their privacy—instead she’s got two rings, high and low priority.) Then she takes a double swig from the thermos of cold iced coffee she always keeps by her bed and read the transcribed voicemail text.

_It’s Hope. I found something of yours. Call me when you get up!_

It’s been a while since she got a text like that from Hope. Amy picks up her phone, leans back on her pillow and makes the voice call.

“I found it,” Hope says. “That stupid black T-shirt that you left at my place that really should go in the laundry, and I almost didn’t call you but I thought because it the protest logo for one of the protests you organized on it you’d want it back—“

“What protest?” Amy says eagerly.

“Sustainable Solar SoCal,” Hope says, and the tone of mockery softens. “I, uh, never washed it.”

“Cool,” Amy answers. “You know we actually won that one, right? Like, we’ve got white roofs on all the new schools now.”

“White roofs,” Hope says. “White girls.”

“Basic white girls,” Amy says. “Like you.”

“Like you.” There’s a pause on the other end. “Do you want to come get it?”

“I don’t know. You never washed it? Have you been wearing it?”

“Only to sleep in. Also I’ve got”—here Hope pauses—“your underwear. Came with the shirt.” Hope pauses again. “I keep ending up with your underwear. Why even is that?”

“I just can’t keep track of my stuff,” Amy says, and she slides down under the hotel duvet, with only the crown of her head up above it. She still has her phone in one hand. “I need so much help.”

“You need so much help, girl,” Hope says. “How old are you?”

“What?” Any asks, not sure where this is going.

“Because the rest of what you left at our house, like, do you still shop in juniors?”

“It’s all thrifted, honestly.”

“Even the bras and underwear. Well done.”

“Not those.”

“Anyway there’s this, like, what do they call them, training bra. With _lace._ And _tiny flowers._ I can’t believe you still wear them.”

“You should talk,” Amy says, closing her eyes.

“You know what though.”

“What, Hope? What?” Now it’s like there’s a very thin membrane, a soap bubble, of some deeper connection that Amy is very eager not to break.

“I’ve been sleeping with those too.”

“My old training bra and my old T-shirt. Both of them. Huh.”

“Yep. Both of them. I inhale their scent when I turn in at night. It’s a source of comfort for this basic white girl. I feel superior and in control.”

“I bet you’ve got my panties too.”

“Wouldn’t be the first time.” Now Hope pauses. “Maybe you should come over and get them.”

“I don’t know,” Amy says slowly. “I’ve got a really busy day today, and it’s my only full day in L.A.” Then, even more slowly, “Tell me what else you do when you sleep in my clothes.”

“Wouldn’t you like to know,” Hope answer. “I just…. They’re mine now. Unless you want them back.”

“I think you do wear them,” Amy says. “I think you wear them every night. You’re wearing them now. I think you’re tired of being this basic hot bitch who thinks she’s better than everyone with nothing but denim fringe and a big scowl and when nobody’s looking you like to dress up as me.”

“What do you think I do when I dress up as you?” Hope challenges Amy this time. Amy’s totally under the duvet by now.

“I think you…I think you sleep in a pile of my stuff and bury your face in my scent. I think that’s your big secret, hot girl. You sleep with my stuff that you took from me and just kept. I think you’ve got something soft and plush and comfortable there in bed with you. Sometimes you wear my T-shirt and nothing else and you’ve got a soft plush comfy bear between your legs.” Hope’s breathing has changed a little. 

Amy goes on. “I think you close your eyes really hard and you imagine how good you are and how good we’d be together. And you imagine that you’re me, just so earnest and naïve and vulnerable and ready to learn. I think you imagine how good that girl called Hope would feel if she kissed you someday, but she’s way to cool to even talk to you. And you slide farther under the sheets and you just think about kissing her some more, and you rub yourself against that plush until you get the hem of my T-shirt a little wet, and the plush gets more wet, and you’re so wet and so distracted that you see double when you open your eyes, you see yourself with that girl Hope, who’s so cool and so harsh and would never want someone like you.

“That’s what you see when you open your eyes, so you close them again and you think of me, that hippie chick who’s so earnest it hurts, who’s even flatter than you, who you could take on your bike and wrap around your body and who would kiss you until she sucked all the air out of you and then hold you between your legs and find that button—“

“Button?” Hope asks, breathing shallowly over the phone.

“Your button, the one you found before you knew what it was, and you curl up around yourself and just inhale my T-shirt, you bite down on it, it’s the only thing you’ve got that smells like me, and you rub yourself against yourself and hope nobody walks in, you’ve got your electric toothbrush on your nightstand and you figured out how to fit it right inside the folds in your favorite bear and you’ve got it turned on now, you move the handle, you pretend I’m right next to you, that I’m holding you in those little earnest do-gooder hippie arms while you touch yourself faster—“

“Ohhhhhh,” Hope says over the phone line. “Ohhhh.” 

“And you put that soft, soft animal right between your legs and you go faster and faster around it,while it’s still humming from the toothbrush, with your eyes closed and your face in all that old worn cotton, thinking about whether Hope would ever kiss you for real, she’s so cool, so cool, so much cooler than you, you’ve got two fingers there now, the pressure’s building and building and building, you think about Hope, but you’ll never have her, this is as close as you’ll come—“

“I’ll come—“

“—the toothbrush and the bear and you get lost in the circles you make when you touch yourself with your soft—your soft—“

Then it’s quiet. Then Hope says something, softly, almost a groan, as if she were stretching out across her own bed even as she said the words. “You have no idea what kind of a mess you made.”

“I made?” Amy asks. “Hey, you called me.”

“With your enthusiastic consent,” Hope answers, because it’s true. 

“I bet I-as-you would be messier than you-as-me.”

“We can try that next time, hippie chick. I need to clean up, though. Like, you have no idea. Also the conference starts really soon.”

“I have some idea,” Amy says, realizing only now how warm the hand that’s not holdng the phone feels under the sheets, her thumb on her mound, fingers between her thighs. “Close your eyes.”

“Some idea?” Hope ripostes. “Only some?”

“I could get a better idea this afternoon,” Amy continues. “Before the big speech.”

“Always have to find time for the big speech,” Hope quips. “See you in twenty minutes?”

“Twenty and counting,” Amy says, and hangs up, and looks across the hotel room for her best pair of slacks, a clean non-underwire bra, a soft black button-down shirt, and of course, her soft cap.

Twenty minutes later Hope sits next to Amy on vinyl stools at a blondwood counter in the hotel foyer, Amy in her conference presenter outfit, Hope in her favorite denim and That One Sleeveless Top, the one she knows Amy likes best. They’re spooning down granola from matching bowls. Occasionally Hope feeds Amy a spoonful. An adjoining diner might see Hope’s big camera, defining its own shape in her pleather bag, or the light canvas sack on her lap, or her non-spoon hand over Amy’s. The banners in the lobby say INTERNATIONAL DESIGN SUSTAINABILITY SUMMIT and DESIGN FROM SOUTHERN AFRICA and DESIGN SAVES LIVES and LISTENING TO PEOPLE WHO ALREADY LIVE THERE and AGAINST TOP-DOWN DEVELOPMENT, and there are placards full of text along with photographs of CCM cookstoves, and vehicle-mounted solar panels, and sustainable apparel workshops. 

“When are we going back there anyway?” Hope asks. “I miss Cape Town. And Gaborone, but really, Cape Town.”

“December. You’ve got another photography portfolio to finish, girl.”

“And you’ve got a couple of articles to write.”

“Can I write them in bed?” Amy asks, taking Hope's hand.

“That sounds like a sustainable development,” Hope replies, only slightly, just slightly, sarcastic. She couldn't throw herself into what Amy's been doing unless she knew how much Amy loved it, how much Amy believed they were making a difference. 

As long as they can be together, Amy thinks, they can make it anywhere.

“Oh,” Hope adds, almost bending over Amy—she’ll always be the taller one. “Here’s your T-shirt. And your bra, and, also, your underwear.” It’s like she’s daring the other breakfast-eaters to pay attention. They don’t.

“I hope you took good care of my stuff,” Amy says. “It’s been a while.”

“More than six hours,” Hope says. “I mean. And, like, look how far they've come. Two whole hotel floors."

“You really slept with them, didn’t you? Look, they’re all wrinkled.”

Hope looks around the hotel foyer and yawns, very visibly. “Where did they find this photographer, anyway?” she says. “These images. So boring. So Western. So white.”

“Hope.” Amy says. “You are not doing yourself any favors.”

“If I can’t make fun of my own work, who can? It’s not like I let you do it.”

“That’s a good point." Hope stands up, brushing her free hand against the jacket draped behind Amy's chair. "Hey, is that vegan leather?"

"Of course it is. Hard to clean, though." Amy swivels her chair instead of standing up. There’s Molly and Annabelle and Jared across the lobby; they’re all showing up for Amy’s talk tonight. “I have to check in with Masego and Sethunya first. I’m not in charge.”

“You don’t like being in charge, do you?”

“Nope,” Amy says. “I like helping. And granola. And hotels. And you.”

“Me as you?” Hope says, quietly.

“Just you. You.”

“You still go for basic hot girls, huh.”

“You still go for super-earnest girls who have absolutely no idea what they’re doing.”

“I think you do.”

“I do.”

“I never thought you’d say ‘I do.’”

“Shut _up._” And they head for their friends, and then for the conference room.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to everyone I've found in this fast growing fandom! For Hope and Amy's adventures in Capetown, see this fic (not by me): https://archiveofourown.org/works/19744357/chapters/46731502


End file.
